Fabric Waves

This is a little film I took on my digital camera. It's a lovely layered fabric rippling on a washing line, and I thought it looked like some rolling waves for a little ship and a stalwart Captain to be navigating. I managed to catch the sun glinting behind, so it looked like reflections on the surface of the seascape.

This is exactly what I imagined to use in my film as a textiley background for my drawings and laser cut pieces. In After Effects I'll be able to combine all of these elements into a single sequence, creating a collage of techniques and a combination of real footage and hand-made elements.

Captain Mo Likes...

I have just added a selection of links to websites I have found particularly inspiring during the course of the project, listed under 'Captain Mo Likes...'. These range from animation studios such as Pixar and Aardman to companies I admire for their merchandising ideas, like San X and Paul Frank.Other notable influences are The Moomins:- a charming collection of stories I loved during my childhood and have recently rediscovered in the form of some beautifully quirky bags:

http://www.itsgorgeous.co.uk/magento/bags?brand=183&p=1 I thought the use of the characters and patterns was really relevant to my own intentions.

For my own project, I hope to create merchandise which captures the visual qualities and characters of the film I'm making and reinvents them in a new context, such as stationery and clothing. My current ideas for products include bags, hot water bottle covers, t-shirts, badges and soft toys.

Moomin 'Spring Day Bag'

Moomin 'Little My Shopper Bag'

Moomin bags by Disaster Designs, accessed online at http://www.itsgorgeous.co.uk/magento/bags/moomin-spring-day-bag.html and

http://www.itsgorgeous.co.uk/magento/bags/moomin-little-my-shopper-bag.html

30/06/10.

The Epic of Captain Mo

THE UNDERWORLD LIKES CAPTAIN MO

Captain Mo has the appearance of a tailor,

But Captain Mo is a stalwart sailor.

Captain Mo likes rum and shortbread

And sleeping with a nightlight by his bed.

Captain Mo doesn’t always speak in rhymes, but he likes to make a good first impression and rhyming often does the trick.

Rhyming is his most immediate method of impressing on a whim, but he has other talents also. Captain Mo has a repertoire of card tricks and does an excellent impression of a budgerigar.

But Captain Mo’s story is a tale of sorrow and isolation.

Every time Captain Mo sets out on a voyage, The Underworld draws him into its tumultuous seas.

Now, no-one will sail with Captain Mo, and he crews his galleon alone.

The Don of the Underworld likes the company of Captain Mo and always offers shortbread when he visits.

But Captain Mo is never pleased to be there.

The Don collects budgerigars and commands them to sing sea shanties for the pleasure of Captain Mo.

Captain Mo reminds the Don of his dark escapades with the formidable cannibal sea monkeys, and his subsequent loss of hearing on occasion.

The Don is disappointed.

Eerie silences are distracting and alarming for the Don in his oubliette.

All that The Don of the Underworld desires is company. He is very lonely because he is the only one around, apart from a skeleton who was boring to talk to. All of the souls of the fallen sailors drift beneath his bastion in an endless and woeful fog.

Captain Mo sails on, determined and relentless, hoping that one day he will reach new seas. Spare a thought for the valiant Captain, who pushes against the cruel barriers of Fate and their desperate clawing at his galleon. He sails onward, never looking back but always looking forward.

“Fate, my endless foe, watch my back as I sail ahead

And forget thy will to pull me to the land of the dead.”

Laser cutting and storytelling

Some of my laser cutting work is now on a website:

http://lasers-uk.com/signage.html

In my future posts I'm hoping to start including Captain Mo's story - the narrative behind the project. The story is much bigger than the elements depicted in the final film, so it's a project I hope to continue working on after this Masters course.

Captain Mo has a long and alarmingly tragic tale of misfortune and adversity, but his epic and endearing struggle against a Fate he doesn't desire will ultimately lead him to triumph.

......Won't it???

Captain Mo is Storyboarded

This week I created an enormous storyboard for the film I'd like to make. I found some old backing sheets from screen printing with nice blotty textures, and started collaging and scribbling down all of my ideas. Although I've now finished planning out the storyboard, I want to keep using this sheet as a base I can pin lots of other information and ideas onto, such as colour chips, photographs, sketches and After Effects plans.

Below, I've added the list of key events in the film, which I wrote to make my storyboard clearer.

STORYBOARD

• Captain Mo sets sail. We watch him bob along the ocean waves as the clouds drift overhead.

• Slowly the sky darkens and the waves grow calm. A lantern bobs in the water, casting a gentle glow. Captain Mo approaches.

• Vooooooom!!! Suddenly... Cranky appears. Captain Mo’s ship reels, Cranky’s gills open and close.

• Mo fires a cannon. The ball hits Cranky’s lantern lure. It tumbles into his open jaws and ricochets around inside him, illuminating his intricate workings for us to see. Little critters inside are controlling him.

• The lantern tumbles to Cranky’s base, and with a dramatic swoon he sinks to the ocean depths, defeated.

• A little lifeboat of Cranky’s internal critters bobs to the surface of the water. They bid farewell and exit right. Captain Mo follows.

• Suddenly, Cranky’s tail resurfaces and grabs Mo’s boat, pulling him down to the eerie waters below.

• We follow Mo on his journey downwards, passing curling tentacles, schools of fish, and piles of ditritus and broken cranky bits.

• The waters grow dark and desolate. Mo’s ship glows in the darkness.

• Finally, we reach the bottom of the ocean. The gates of the Underworld stand before Mo’s ship. Cranky’s head is buried in the sand. The Underworld’s gate slowly growls open... and we see Mo swept inside.

• The gate shuts, the curtain falls. To be continued....

Cranky Merchandise

Today I started thinking about what merchandise would suit my film if it were being promoted. T-shirts were my first thought, and I had a go at introducing Cranky into a design. I started considering other ideas, such as badges, stationery, posters and postcards. I posed the question on my Facebook page, and received a fantastic response of suggestions including mugs, bags, duvet covers, soft toys, playing cards and cushions. I hope to spend the final 4 weeks of my course designing products and merchandise, and a collection of fabrics inspired by the film. Thermochromic dyes (dyes which react to heat and change colour) could be an effective method of storytelling within these fabrics, relating elements of the narrative depicted in the project.

After Effects, Episode 3

This film was again created using the basics I have been learning in Adobe After Effects. This time, I experimented in using the text tools, parent layers and altering anchor points.

I decided to animate the poster-like image I drew in the second semester, so I could select simple elements to manipulate. I used Photoshop to extract the waves, clouds, ship, monster head and monster jaw from the design, and saved each of these as single files with transparent backgrounds. I also erased the text from the design so that I could animate it instead. I saved the design with all of these empty spaces, ready for the elements to be re-inserted, and selected a textured background to use from a photograph I took of a weatherworn boat.

I used the original design, with the empty gaps, as a 'parent layer.' This enabled me to attach the other elements to it, meaning they would animate in the same manner. As the parent layer travels up, so do the other layers attached to it. This also means that the 'child' layers can be animated independently, for example - the clouds travel up with the design, but can also travel left on their own path. Finally, I added the ship, and altered its anchor point to attach it to the crest of a wave. I could then rotate the ship, giving it a bobbing motion on the waves.

Although these are still very basic animation techniques, I am beginning to better understand the concepts and can start adapting and developing them towards the final sequence I intend to create.

Captain Mo in 3D

I have finally completed all of the online Adobe After Effects tutorials and my brain is full of knowledge. Below is the original movie posted last week, but this time I added additional camera angles and transformed my layers into 3D. Still a bit jerky and awkward... but I'm gradually finding my way around using the programme. Captain Mo's epic adventures are slowly taking shape...

Steampunking in York

This weekend I visited the National Railway Museum in York. It was a spectacular source for inspiration, and the Warehouse's collection of archive treasures was fascinating. I took dozens of photos of weatherworn textures, mechanical workings and recovered artifacts from a bygone era.

I loved the colour palettes- gleaming coppers, beaten metals, worn leathers, faded patterned textile interiors, dynamic paintwork and the dull rusting bolts holding it all together. Not only was this an incredible find for Steampunk references, but it also had a nostalgic resonance which drew the visitor deeper into the narrative behind the exhibits.

Captain Mo Meets Adobe (And they get along nicely)

This week, my challenge was to begin learning Adobe After Effects. I have no experience in this software and so I've started at the very beginning. These online tutorials are amazing:

http://www.lynda.com/home/DisplayCourse.aspx?lpk2=69

I have slowly started working my way through the tutorials and attempted some of my own experiments. I hope to complete this training over the next week or so, and will update my blog with my progress. To begin- my very first After Effects sequence. Captain Mo has set sail.... and the final project begins!!

Laser Cutting with Mo, Episode 2

The latest subjects for a laser cut makeover are some photographs I took in the first semester of the project. I decided to experiment in creating silhouettes from textures, in the hope that they could create effective shadows or set pieces for the final film. I selected some weatherworn brickwork and a gently rolling sea to use as test pieces. By altering the brightness and contrast of the images in Photoshop, I was able to extract enough of the texture to create a design which would be suitable for laser cutting. Shown below is the original photograph, and the final laser cut piece. The detail is incredible, and with some effective manipulation of the lighting I think they can become a valuable element of the final film.

Laser Cutting with Mo

At last - my mechanical sea beast, or 'Cranky' as I like to call him, is taking form. Here are some photos of the laser cutter in action, and the final results. The next step is to work out the best method of animating this using stop motion, perhaps by removing some elements so they can be manipulated individually, or else laser-cutting several variations of the design which can be photographed separately and run together.